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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23648350">He Holds him close, Just to Keep the World at Bay</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/notebooksandlaptops/pseuds/notebooksandlaptops'>notebooksandlaptops</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The Amazing Devil inspired prompts [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types, Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Cuddling &amp; Snuggling, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia Has Feelings, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia Needs a Hug, Hurt/Comfort, Jaskier | Dandelion Loves Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 22:00:39</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,046</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23648350</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/notebooksandlaptops/pseuds/notebooksandlaptops</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“You’re going to leave,” the words are pulled from his lips without his permission, and they sit heavy in the space between them. Because of course, Jaskier is. Jaskier has seen what Geralt is, the story Geralt is doomed to repeat. Jaskier has spent the past few years convincing the world that it is wrong – that Geralt is a hero and not a monster. Today though, he saw it. Today he saw that he is the one who is wrong and that the world had it right all along. </p><p>He was going to leave because Geralt couldn’t save her. </p><p>He was going to leave because one day, maybe, Geralt wouldn’t be able to save him. </p><p>Except-</p><p>Except that there is a hand cupping his jaw, gentle, soft. There is a thumb brushing across his cheekbone. “Never,” Jaskier breathes. A promise. “It wasn’t your fault.”</p><p>-///-</p><p>For the Amazing Devil Inspired Prompts: “And he holds her close just to keep the world at bay” + “she brushes her hand through his hair, he’s got so much fucking hair”</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia &amp; Jaskier | Dandelion, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The Amazing Devil inspired prompts [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1693501</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>38</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>544</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>He Holds him close, Just to Keep the World at Bay</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>This is the story: he couldn’t save her.</p><p>Round, and round and round again. Repeated over and over. Dozens of different, unique scenarios, dozens of different, unique towns, dozens of different, unique women. Yet the story is always the same: he couldn’t save her.</p><p>
  <em>He couldn’t save her. </em>
</p><p>They come to him, at night in dreams, or in flashes of memory so vivid he can smell them. They blame him for their deaths. And they are right to.</p><p>In his dreams, they all have Renfri’s voice, but she is just one of many. Whether she stands out because he could have loved her, or because he <em>made </em>love to her in that forest, or because it was his sword that sliced through her he doesn’t know. She wasn’t the first, after all, and she wouldn’t be the last.</p><p>She speaks to him. She taunts him. <em>The girl in the woods, she is your destiny. </em>But whoever the girl in the woods is – well. He knows the story now. Knows exactly how it goes. It is a tale of four words that never, ever ends no matter how hard he tries.</p><p>
  <em>He couldn’t save her. </em>
</p><p>And now, in this small town, not that far away from the Cintra border, there is another girl. She cannot be older than her fifteenth name day, and yet there is no scent of fear on her as she approaches him. One of only three humans who he can say that that is true for. It should be a blessing. Instead, it feels more a curse.</p><p>She has dirty blonde hair and a mischievous smile.</p><p>She reminds him all too much of Marilka from Blavikan.</p><p>Marilka didn’t smell of fear when she met Geralt either. But she did when he left.</p><p>The girl explains everything nearby one of the stables she helps tend the horses in. Jaskier is charming, as Jaskier always is. Jaskier, Geralt must admit, helps with contacts. He is far more outwardly sympathetic to their plights than Geralt knows how to be and that puts people at ease. The tales that the villagers spin are always full of more truths and more detail when Jaskier is the one asking the questions.</p><p>The girl tells him this: her father was taken two days previously. He went to check on the goats and did not come back. He is the fourth such disappearance in the village and there are no signs of bandits. The woods at the outskirts however, have had a strange smell to them since winter, and the village folk believe they are haunted by something sinister. They suspect a monster.</p><p>Geralt takes the contract.</p><p>The girl follows him and Jaskier when they head to the woods, Geralt with his swords drawn and ready. The girl is loud, and talkative, and does not turn back to the village when Geralt tells her too.</p><p>She reminds him all too much of Jaskier.</p><p>Jaskier, for his part, is taken by her. He laughs at her jokes and spins tales of Geralt’s ‘adventures’ that stretch the truth around the lie that is Geralt the Hero, the man that doesn’t exist, the man Jaskier makes him out to be.</p><p>But Geralt knows this tale. He knows it like the back of his hand. He knows it in Renfri’s eyes watching him, in a scrap of blonde hair, in the mournful screams of a mother holding a dead daughter.</p><p>
  <em>He couldn’t save her. </em>
</p><p>The thing taking the villagers turns out to be one of the larger species of arachnids – rare, these days, but not extinct. This is good. He hadn’t had much hope that the girl's father was still alive, but arachnids killed slowly, drained their victim's bit by bit. And it had only been two days.</p><p>He saves the father.</p><p>But, and, here it is the same story as ever: <em>He couldn’t save her. </em></p><p>The girl rushes in before Geralt has dealt with the threat, ducks past where Jaskier is trying to keep her out of the fight tries to get to her Dad. It’s the wrong way to go about it; you kill the monster <em>then </em>you save its victims, but she’s barely fifteen, how could she know that?</p><p>The arachnid leaves Geralt and goes to defend its prey.</p><p>And it snaps her neck in two with its pincers.</p><p>It’s over. It’s over so quickly.</p><p>
  <em>He couldn’t save her. </em>
</p><p>The rest of the contract goes over easily, but Geralt is barely there. He kills the monster. He saves the father (who kneels next to his daughter and weeps and weeps – a father who was saved only to wish to die all over again). He returns the body to the mother. He leaves quickly, without payment. He has learnt this lesson in this regard. When he can’t save them, he should not stick around for long. He will be blamed by more than just the voices of the dead in his head. He will be blamed by men with swords, by furious fathers and wailing mothers.</p><p>So he leaves.</p><p>He barely even registers Jaskier is still around until they’re setting up for the night out in the open and the bard begins to make a fire.</p><p>Jaskier has been uncharacteristically quiet, he realises. That makes sense. This is the first time he’s seen this tale – <em>he couldn’t save her </em>- play out first-hand even if the tale is as old as Geralt himself.</p><p>Perhaps now Jaskier understands it. Perhaps finally, finally, he sees the monster. His inability to save Renfri was what made Marilka see it. Perhaps his inability to save this one will be what makes Jaskier see it.</p><p>Geralt doesn’t talk. He doesn’t do anything. He gets out the brushes for Roach but merely stands in front of the horse without going through the motions he needs to sort her tangled mane and soft fur. All he sees is the girl's eyes in his head.</p><p>“Geralt.”</p><p>All he hears is Renfri’s voice blaming him.</p><p>“Geralt?”</p><p>All he can smell is the spike of fear when that thing <em>twisted </em>until her neck snapped.</p><p>“Geralt.”</p><p>Geralt jumps caught off guard. There is a hand on his shoulder and bright, cornflower blue eyes are watching him.</p><p>
  <em>Jaskier. </em>
</p><p>“Your hands are shaking,” Jaskier murmurs, the hand resting on his shoulder slips lower, and it is only when Jaskier is taking his hand in order to stop it from doing so that Geralt belatedly realises that he is right. His hand is shaking.</p><p>
  <em>He couldn’t save her. </em>
</p><p>“You’re going to leave,” the words are pulled from his lips without his permission, and they sit heavy in the space between them. Because of course, Jaskier is. Jaskier has seen what Geralt is, the story Geralt is doomed to repeat. Jaskier has spent the past few years convincing the world that it is wrong – that Geralt is a hero and not a monster. Today though, he saw it. Today he saw that he is the one who is wrong and that the world had it right all along.</p><p>He was going to leave because Geralt couldn’t save her.</p><p>He was going to leave because one day, maybe, Geralt wouldn’t be able to save him.</p><p>Except-</p><p>Except that there is a hand cupping his jaw, gentle, soft. There is a thumb brushing across his cheekbone. “Never,” Jaskier breathes. A promise. “It wasn’t your fault.”</p><p>Geralt doesn’t believe that. Can’t believe that. So he says nothing at all.</p><p>He can’t stop himself from leaning his head into Jaskier’s hand though. He’s weak. And when Jaskier is touching him, the accusatory tone of Renfri’s voice quietens. It gives him something to focus on that is not how this is going to keep on happening. It gives him something to focus on that isn’t that girls eyes – all their eyes – dead and unseeing.</p><p>“Come with me,” Jaskier whispers, and the hand on his cheek is briefly removed as Jaskier pulls the brush from his fingers and sets it down, pulls Geralt over to where their bedrolls are laid out (Geralt didn’t lay them out – Jaskier must have, but when? He was…really out of it. Far, far too out of it). Jaskier encourages him to sit, and he does, because he doesn’t know what else to do.</p><p>
  <em>He couldn’t save her. </em>
</p><p>“You save so many people, and yet when someone dies on your watch, it just confirms what the whole world thinks, doesn’t it?” Jaskier murmured. He was…annoyingly perceptive at times. Geralt clenched his jaw, didn’t speak.</p><p>“Well. Let me help you keep the world at bay for a little while. Until morning.”</p><p>And then he’s gently tugging Geralt downwards until Geralt’s head is laid in his lap. It’s—an odd position. He’s never laid like this with anyone. Oh, he’s had women and men before, yes, at whorehouses across the whole continent but he’s never been held like <em>this. </em>This isn’t sexual. It isn’t done with expectation. But it’s…intimate.</p><p>Jaskier’s hand is in his hair, brushing through it, and his voice is a light murmur near Geralt’s ear, “You’ve got so much fucking hair.”</p><p>Geralt can’t speak. He doesn’t know what to say. He hopes Jaskier doesn’t expect him to say anything. He’s all out of words.</p><p>But Jaskier doesn’t start up conversation again. Instead, he begins to hum. It’s a soft tune, like a lullaby.</p><p>All of this is—it’s so close to being too much. But no, Jaskier, somehow <em>always </em>knows what is just enough. And here he is, giving Geralt exactly what Geralt needs. Geralt doesn’t even really understand why. Jaskier doesn’t owe him anything. They’re not in each other’s debt that way.</p><p>He knows what Jaskier would reply if he asked why. Jaskier says they’re <em>friends. </em>For Jaskier, that means things like this.</p><p>Maybe they are friends.</p><p>Maybe they’re family.</p><p>Geralt doesn’t know, but he knows that there is nobody else on this earth who understands him quite the way Jaskier does. It terrifies him. It thrills him. There is nobody else who would pull a witchers head – a monsters head – into their lap and soothe nibble lute-calloused fingers through it’s hair. And yet Jaskier does freely, without thought.</p><p>There is sunlight coming through the trees by the time Geralt says anything again. Jaskier is still humming, still running fingers through Geralt’s hair.</p><p>He stayed up all night.</p><p>For Geralt.</p><p>“I’ll tell you what happened in Blavikan,” Geralt murmurs. It isn’t the whole story – there are far too many stories that can be summed up with <em>he didn’t save her. </em>But it is one of them. It is one of the bigger ones. And he still carries the name that Blavikan gifted him, no matter what other titles Jaskier tries to come up with in his songs.</p><p>Jaskier stops humming, but – for once – says nothing. He waits for Geralt to begin.</p><p>Geralt speaks. He surprises himself by it. But he speaks. He tells Jaskier. He tells him of Renfri, of Stregabor, of Marilka. And it ends, of course, as they all end, “I couldn’t save her.”</p><p>He’s half expecting it to chase Jaskier off. He’s always expecting something he does to chase Jaskier off.</p><p>Instead, Jaskier leans forward and presses his lips to Geralt’s forehead.</p><p>Geralt shifts to look at him, keeping his head in the other's lap.</p><p>“Thank you for telling me,” Jaskier says, and the earnestness in his voice makes something ache inside Geralt’s chest. “But I need you to stop worrying I’m going to leave. I’m going to stay, Geralt. I’m not Marilka. I’m not Renfri. I’m <em>me. </em>And as you may have noticed, I’m pretty hard to chase off, even when you want to. I’m staying.”</p><p>The sun is playing through brown strands that are falling into Jaskier’s eyes. Jaskier’s got bags under his eyes. He’s tired. Geralt kept him up all night. Geralt kept him up all night and told him how he got the name Butcher, and still, Jaskier is staying he is going to stay.</p><p>Maybe, just maybe, Geralt can start believing in that promise.</p><p> </p><p>-///-</p><p> </p><p>The story is always the same: <em>He couldn’t save her. </em></p><p>The story is always the same: <em>Jaskier stays anyway and holds him close when it’s too much, just to keep the world at bay.</em></p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I now take tumblr prompts for cute lil ficlets like this! If you're interested  <a href="https://jaskier-wearing-dresses.tumblr.com/">@Jaskier-wearing-dresses</a> just drop one in my inbox :) (or just come say hi in general, always happy to make new witcher friends)</p><p>Toss a comment or a kudos to your fanfic writer?</p></blockquote></div></div>
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